The thrust of Gottlieb's piece is that for Los Angeles to truly be a world leader in environmental issues the city needs to embrace cycling. In a city with many psychological barriers to getting on a bike, the city needs to reach out to under-represented communities when it comes to riding a bike such as seniors and women. The op/ed comes days after the Los Angeles County Bike Coalition released the results of their bike count showing only 12% of cyclists counted were women. Further, Gottlieb argues that we need more leadership from the city after singleing out Mayor Villaraigosa for talking the talk on the environment.

We need visionaries and "practical idealists" (as
Villaraigosa likes to say) to push these kinds of changes forward.
Janette Sadik-Khan, New York's transportation commissioner -- who is
coming to L.A. in March to receive an honorary degree from Occidental
College -- has been an inspiration to bike advocates and climate change
activists alike. Wander around Times Square or down Ninth Avenue and
you immediately see how the streetscape has been changed to accommodate
bike riders and walkers.